Container



Junelz, 1945. J, s GATES 2,378,128y

CONTAINER Filed Dec. 50, 1942 ATTORNEY Patented June 12, 1945 CONTAINER Joseph S. Cates, South Bend, Ind., assigner to United States Rubber Company, New York, N. Y.. a corporation of New Jersey Application December 30, 1942, Serial No. 470,698

1 Claim.

This invention relates to containers 'for storing liquids, and is especially adapted to storing gasolene and oil for aviation motors, distilled water for storage battery installations and the like.

It is usual at airports and other places where large quantities of motor fuel must be kept, tc store gasolene in large metal tanks, containing thousands of gallons, and disposed either above or below the surface of the ground. Such tanks and their accompanying piping require heavy equipment and large numbers of skilled workmen for their installation and when installed are more or less permanent, that is they cannot readily be moved. In military operations it is important to be able readily to transport containers for the storage of large quantities of gasolene and other liquids and to set up such containers quickly with a small number of unskilled persons.

The present invention provides means for accomplishing this objective by providing light, exible, collapsible storage containers which are capable of holding large quantities of liquid and which can be readily transported and set up. In accordance with my invention I provide a flexible liquid icontainer formed of a relatively small quantity of impervious material, and I provide a separate container, made in sections, which supports the impervious container and thus supports the weight and hydrostatic forces of the confined liquid,` relieving the impervious container of all stresses due to the weight of the stored liquid. In this manner a light and easily transported container is provided having a minimum quantity of impervious material, the outer or supporting container being made of readily available and inexpensive materials which need not be impervious to the stored liquid.

In the accompanying drawing:

Fig. 1 is a perspective View of one form of container embodying the invention;

Fig. 2 is a schematic top `plan of the container shown in Fig. l, the piping connections and tie rods being removed for clarity in illustration; and

Fig. 3 is an enlarged plan view of a detail of Fig. 2, showing a corner of the outer container.

The storage container includes a closed cylindrical container lli which forms an impervious liquid containing element, and which is disposed in an outer container l2 of polygonal form approximating a cylinder, which furnishes the support for the weight of the liquid.` The inner container is formed of any suitable light weight, flexible substantially inelastic material which is both inert and impervious to the liquid to be stored. Preferably the material is inert to aromatic hydrocarbon fuels. An example of such material is textile fabric impregnated with a suitable synthetic rubber or rubber-like composition, such as the olefin polysulphide plastic material known in the trade as Thiokol. Preferably fabric impreghated with the inert material is cut to proper shape and size and the pieces are cemented or :vulcanized together, with or without sewing, to

form a closed cylinder of desired size, all joints being rendered impervious to the liquid to be stored in any suitablemanner known in the art.

The fabric inner container has a circular bottom wall Il and a circular top I6 joined by a cylindrical'side wall I0. The edge of the top wall is turned up and joined to the upper edge of the cylindrical side wall to provide an up-standing flange I9 to which loops of fabric 20 may be secured to facilitate handling and to provide supports for attaching the side wall to the top edge of the outer container.

The inner container may be filled, drained, and vented by any suitable conduits preferably all attached to a single plate or support 22 shown in Fig. 1, suitably secured to an opening 23 in the top wall shown in Fig. 2. As illustrated a vent pipe 28 and a filling and emptying pipe 30 are secured to the plate 22. The pipe 30 is preferably flexible, for example being formed of a 'Ihiokol hose, so that the inner container can be collapsed and rolled up without danger of injury.

The outer container is formed of a number of substantially rigid staves or panels 3|, made of any suitable material such as plywood, which are placed upright in the form of a regular polygon. 'Ihe individual panels `34 are joined along their juxtaposed edges by any suitable connecting means, the particular construction of which forms no part of my invention. One such suitable connecting means may be constructed as shown in Fig. 3. A metal plate or channel member 35, running the entire length of the edges of the panels 34 provides a pair of channels 38 and 31 disposed at the proper angle to form the corneiof the poly.. gon and each of the appropriate width to receive snugly the edge of a panel 34. The channels may be formed by a pair of plates 38 and 29 formed as shown and joined between the panels by any suitable means such as welding or by rivets 40. At suitable intervals along the channel members saddles 42 may be secured, as by spot welding.V The saddles serve as bearings for suitable tie rods 4l and may have hooks I8 for supporting the tie rods while they are being tightened in assembling the tank. The toe rods hold the panels together against the hydrostatic force ofliquid in the container, and are preferably inextensible steel rods or bands, as opposed to cables which may stretch and permit the panels to be pushed out of the channels of the connecting plates.

.The outer container may have a floor if desired, but preferably the inner container rests upon the ground, and the outer container supports all of the horizontal hydrostatic forces due to the weight of the contained liquid. This is accomplished by making the inner container slightly larger than the outer container, that is the diameter of the inner container, when unconilned, is slightly larger than the diameter of the circle circumscribed about the polygon formed by the inner surfaces of the panels It. In Fig. 2 the normal unconned diameter of the inner container is represented by the broken-line circle 48. Thus when the inner container is placed within the outer container and filled with liquid, the bottom wall and the side wall wrinkle slightly as shown in Fig. 2 and are quite slack. Thus there is no stress on the inner container due to the weight of the conned liquid, and the container may be made of very light fabric, which need be only heavy enough to withstand handling without injury, 1

Preferably the bottom wall I4 is secured in any suitable manner to a ground cloth 50 which may be a piece of canvas. This protects the bottom of the inner container from abrasion and facilitates stretching or smoothing of the bottom so as to dll up the entire space within the outer container in the. course of erecting or assembling the storage containers. and thus insures that the corner where the side wall loins the bottom will be positioned in the corner between the ground and the outer container. and precludes the possibility of straining the inner container at this corner when it is filled.

The invention thus facilitates the storing of large quantities of liquid fuel in relatively inexpensive containers Which may be transported and set up quickly by unskilled persons with a minimum of simple tools. It also permits the storage of large quantities of aircraft fuel in contalners requiring relatively small quantities of inert o r impervious material because the inner container supports no weight and therefore can be made of very light material.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim and desire to protect by letters Patent is:

A readily assembled and dismounted liquid storage tank comprising a plurality of substantially rigid upstanding panels, channel members detachably engaging and supporting the edges of adjacent panels, detachable means for retaining and supporting the channel members, a closed container of flexible impervious fabric mounted Within and laterally supported by the panels, and a ground cloth secured to the container and extending outwardly between the ground and the lower surfaces of the panels and channels for holding the lower portion of the container in position relative thereto.

JOSEPH S. GATES. 

